Thomas Gold Appleton as soon as quipped that when good Americans die, they go to Paris.
Yet it’s arduous to not marvel if a single style of the chocolate diamond at Jena Bakery may need swayed him to reroute heaven’s expressway straight to Bahrain.
Eating one in every of these confections is, in any case, like getting a hug from a long-lost buddy.
Imagine a humble biscuit base – not your garden-variety biscuit base, however one which’s so so sumptuously buttery, it begins to soften in your mouth on the faintest trace of a nibble.
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As if that’s not sufficient, the diamond is then topped with a beneficiant slab of chocolate so thick, it asserts a scrumptious dominance over your complete creation.
The recipe, guarded with a zeal that makes Fort Knox look positively laissez-faire, is a household heirloom, etched not on paper (that will be far too dangerous) however within the minds of its creators.
Perhaps surprisingly, the proprietor of Jena Bakery isn’t truly referred to as Jena in any respect – the place is called after her daughter.
She is, in reality, Narise Kamber, whose baking origin story is steeped within the sepia tones of childhood, evoking the nostalgia of household gatherings at her grandparents’ home in close by Manama.
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The chocolate diamonds have graced the show circumstances because the bakery first opened its doorways a long time in the past, and attributable to their success have typically been imitated by native rivals – though that will be like utilizing crayon to breed the Mona Lisa.
But for the actual McCoy, enterprise to the good authentic in Hamala, only a stone’s throw from the motorway.
Here, supply drivers line up like penguins, able to ferry parcels of the coveted treats in sixes and 12s to the sweet-toothed of Bahrain.
Crossing the edge, the air is thick with the candy, heady aromas of recent baking.
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Take the Nutella squares – chocolatey love letters, dense and fudgy, every chew one in every of hazelnut-chocolate bliss.
Then there are the pink lemonade muffins, born from the culinary genius of Narise’s progeny, Nabil.
They’re edible summer season days, the place every slice is a steadiness of tart whimsy and sugary flirtation, as if sunshine and laughter have been baked right into a sponge.
If your candy tooth remains to be standing unvanquished, it’s about to fulfill its Waterloo within the type of Jena Bakery’s Herculean dessert bowls.
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Here, you could have a selection – to plunge into the depths of a mango trifle, a layered affair of fruit and cream, or to face down the enigmatic attract of the chocolate shock.
Either manner, it’s a foregone conclusion – they’re each unabashedly, unapologetically scrumptious.
In Jena Bakery’s candy showdown, there are finally no losers – solely blissfully defeated palates, surrendering to the irresistible attract of muffins, bakes, and people chocolate diamonds.